INTERNET OF THINGS WORLD — While Avnet is both the title sponsor of IoT World 2018 and a big newsmaker with its Connected Ecosystem, there are plenty of innovative, channel-focused suppliers among the more than 300 exhibitors at this Channel Partners sister show, held this week at the Santa Clara (California) Convention Center. Trying to catch the attention of the 11,000 attendees took a mix of cool IoT demos, unique swag and, for some exhibitors, massive and colorful booths.

Avnet discussed its connected ecosystem of companies, services, solutions and partners that it says provides more than 2 million customers with the tools and resources they need to bring their IoT projects to market. In his keynote opening the show, Lou Lutostanski, global vice president, internet of things for Avnet, told attendees that risks associated with IoT include business models, implementation and life-cycle management of sensors. IoT solution providers must help mitigate these risks and enable customers and partners scale up deployments.

“IoT is not about technology but about business transformation,” said Lutostanski.

Live demos at its booth include the AT&T IoT Starter Kit, a complete development environment for sensor-to-cloud applications. Attendees lined up to see the recently announced Microsoft Azure Sphere, a new solution for creating highly secure, internet-connected microcontroller-powered devices, in action. Avnet is Microsoft’s lead partner for Azure Sphere and the first to distribute the product, which launched at RSA 2018. The solution aims to simplify IoT projects by combining three components that work together to secure and power devices at the edge: a variety of microcontrollers with security baked into the silicon; the Azure Sphere OS, which is built on a Linux kernel; and a cloud-based service that includes device-to-device and device-to-cloud communication secured through certificate-based authentication.

The expansive expo floor featured two stages and channel-focused suppliers covering the gamut from sensor hardware to platforms to connectivity. Watch the event highlight videos, then scroll through our gallery below for some familiar names, and five providers you might not have on your IoT radar.